


Out There to the Blue

by returntosaturn



Category: The Good Doctor (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, Lea thinks a lot about everything, Shaun visits Lea, Sort of Plotless, eeeeehhhhh...., just some fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-21
Updated: 2018-02-21
Packaged: 2019-03-21 23:07:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13751130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/returntosaturn/pseuds/returntosaturn
Summary: She smiled wistfully out over the asphalt ahead, shifting her hands on the wheel. “Man, I really missed you,” she breathed.“Missed me? Like a dripping faucet?”She took a deep breath, closing her eyes for the barest of seconds, just letting herself settle into the moment. The feeling of having him back. “Yeah. I guess you could say it's kinda like that.”





	Out There to the Blue

It was September before he could find the time to come visit. At his one year mark, Dr. Melendez granted him four days as a congratulations of sorts. And out of the four days, two were basically taken up with traveling. It wasn’t much, but after nine months, she’d take just about anything. 

Glassman arranged a ticket for him, and she offered up the guest room of the little house she was renting just on the outskirts of Hershey, which meant the middle of absolute nowhere. She hoped that seventy-two hours in a little town with a much slower pace than San Jose would be good for him. Let him unwind a bit.

She took the powder blue Chevelle to the airport to pick him up. It had quickly become her pride and joy now that the rust was gone and it was given a new engine built by her own hands. It felt poignant somehow; to rev up the first thing she’d set her hands to since she’d gotten here, even if the tire lettering she wanted to do hadn’t gotten done yet. She could overlook it, she supposed, if it meant he got to ride shotgun. 

He was already waiting outside the terminal when she pulled in. She spotted him immediately, perched on a bench with his backpack in his lap, an island of calm to the hustle and bustle around him. 

“Hey!” She shouted across the concourse through the open passenger window, and waited for his wide-eyed gaze to tick up and over to her. The growl of the engine ricocheted through the terminal, thundering against the cement exterior of the breezeway, but she was even louder.

She shoved her sunglasses up into her hair. “You waiting for somseone?” she called over to him, grinning goofily, bracing her forearm against the wheel so she could lean across the cab.

He drew himself to standing, clutching his bag to his chest as he carefully picked his way across the lane of parked taxis to the passenger side of her car.

“Hello, Lea,” he said in his typical cadence, but to her it sounded like a song she’d forgotten about a long time ago. Like the ones that always crept up from the depths of her iPod at times she least expected.

She smiled up at him, not caring how doey-eyed it might look. 

“I was waiting for you,” he confirmed, in answer to her unceremonious greeting.

“I know, silly. I’m really happy to see you. Get in.”

She delighted in the way just the tiniest hint of color pinked his cheeks while he worked to tug the door open and then fold himself inside, hunching his shoulders and ducking his chin under the low roof.

“This is not the striped tomato,” he said, pulling the door closed with its customary bang.

“No. It’s a car I rebuilt. I named her Jeanie. Wanna put your backpack in the backseat?”

Slowly, he uncurled his fingers from the straps of his backpack and let her take it, looking back to be sure she set it in a visible spot.

“You...named your car?”

“Yeah. Gives it a little personality, don’t you think? I haven’t always done that, but ever since  _ somebody  _ nicknamed the Gran Torino, it’s become a habit. I decided to go with a theme. Classic cable television series. Lucy, Kitt, and Lurch are back at the shop. I’ll have to show them off to you.”

Shaun shook his head side to side. “I don’t like _ I Love Lucy _ . It’s too loud.”

“Yeah, she’s a 1966 Ford Galaxie 7-Litre, with a glasspack, so the name is fitting, trust me.” She tipped her sunglasses back into place and shoved the car into gear.

She found a detour as soon as she could leave the freeway behind, heading for the back roads where the forest was thickest.

“It’s quiet here,” he said after a few long, silent moments, watching the tops of the trees through the passenger window. “I like it.”

She glanced over at him, his fingers knitting themselves together over his heart.

“You do? I’ve enjoyed the change of pace. I hope you will too.”

He hummed softly.

“How was your flight?” she said, turning back to the road. 

“I don’t like flying. I like riding in the car. With you.”

She smiled wistfully out over the asphalt ahead, shifting her hands on the wheel. “Man, I really missed you,” she breathed. 

“Missed me? Like a dripping faucet?”

She took a deep breath, closing her eyes for the barest of seconds, just letting herself settle into the moment. The  _ feeling  _ of having him back. “Yeah. I guess you could say it's kinda like that.”

He hummed again, attention drifting back up to the endless stretch of trees. 

“Hey,” she said after a beat, smiling his way. “Did you bring my baseball?” 

He looked over and nodded once, proudly. “I did. It’s in a box in my bag to prevent it from breaking on the flight.”

“How thoughtful of you,” she said, grinning when his cheeks flushed again.

“So hey. How about we go back to my house, let you unpack and settle in, and then you come to the shop with me? I want to show you my babies. And I’ve got a little work I wanted to get done. But you can help! Does that sound good?”

She watched him go wide eyed at the pet name she used for her cars, and smirked to herself off his expression.

“I don’t know much about cars,” he answered, uncertain.

“That’s ok. You can pass me tools and stuff. You can be like the...what’s the person called that hands the surgeon the scalpels and stuff?” She chuckled at herself. “Is that even a thing, or is that only on TV?”

“They’re called the surgical technician. In colloquial terms, we’d call them the scrub tech.” He gave a satisfied nod. 

“Alright then, you can be my scrub tech.”

Though it only lasted a moment or two, she caught his toothy grin out of the corner of her eye.

-

“Your house is old,” he announced, following her through the door. 

She laughed under her breath. “Hey. I’m blue collar now. Cut me some slack.”

“But it’s nice,” he amended, even though she doubted he caught his faux pas. “You got rid of some stuff.”

“I had to. This place is only two bedrooms. Some of it just couldn’t come with. I got to ship over my bed with the trundle. Oh, and the foosball table.” She pointed into the living room that, for the record, housed two new sofas and really nice armchair that she’d fallen asleep in more nights than she’d like to admit, up late playing Doom. “My brother helped me paint. It was all orange and yellow when I moved in. Thank god the owner let me change it. We brought over some furniture from my grandparents’ house for the guest room, but it’s nice I promise. The mattress is brand new.”

She led him across the living room and down the short hallway to the bedrooms, parallel from each other. 

“This is me…” She pointed at the door on the left side, and then the right. “And this is you. We’re neighbors again.”

She looked up to him, grinning at her own joke to see he was smiling too, eyes trained on her bedroom door.

“You want to unpack? There’s a dresser in there. Bathroom’s right there…” She pointed. “I’m gonna throw together something for us to eat. Sound good?”

He nodded silently and shuffled forward, letting himself inside.

She busied herself in the kitchen, and by the time he reappeared sans backpack, fingers twined over his chest, she was snapping the lid on the lunchbox she’d packed everything into.

“What’s that?” he asked, only appearing a little suspicious.

“Dinner.” She brandished a fresh, red apple in her other hand. “And a snack.”

He reached out to take it without hesitation. “I am  _ very  _ hungry,” he declared with a nod.

She laughed and wrinkled her nose at him. “Well you’ll have to wait just a little bit for the real deal. We’ve got work to do, and then I’ve got a surprise. Come on, let’s hurry. You can snack in the car.”

-

“Five-eights.”

“Five-eights,” he replied, pressing the wrench into her palm.

“Hey you’re really good at this.” She twisted to smirk up at him from where she was bent beneath the hood of the old Saab she’d affectionately named Lurch. 

He pointed a tentative finger, grinning boyishly. 

“You have grease on your face.”

She stuck out her tongue and turned back to the car.

“So tell me about good ol’ San Jose. How’s Glassy?”

“He’s ok. I took some therapy.”

“I heard. How was that?”

“It was my decision,” he affirmed, nodding when she looked up at him in surprise.

“I didn’t know that. What made you decide that?”

He swayed from foot to foot, his hands twisting together. “Mmm...you did.”

She froze, setting aside the wrench on the edge of the hood with a soft tap.

“What?” 

He ducked his chin. “I didn’t feel confused when I was with you. When you were gone, I was confused again.”

Lea felt her throat go tight. She leaned a hip against the edge of the car, waiting for him to go on. 

“I realized having a friend...a person...made me feel better. It helped me understand. It helped me be…” He took a long pause, seemingly deciding how to thread his words together, but whatever he had meant to say was gone. He squared his shoulders and went on, more certain this time. “Claire said you weren’t the only person who could make me happy, and I think she was right.”

She nodded. “That’s true, Shaun,” she said, her voice thin.

“But I realized that taking therapy didn’t mean taking away my self reliance. It meant learning about other people. Other people that had the potential to be my friends, too. Other people that had the potential to make me happy, and other people that might need my help.”

Lea blinked and turned away. “Shaun…” A tear streaked unexpected across her cheek. She lifted her hand to wipe at it with the sleeve of her jacket. 

“I didn’t mean to make you cry,” he said matter-of-factly. “But I can see that you’re proud.”

“I’m  _ very  _ proud,” she insisted, nodding. “And I don’t know Claire, but she sounds like a badass.” She laughed thinly, sputtering through her tears, wiping at the rest of them with black-polished fingernails.

“I didn’t mean to make you cry,” he repeated, his tone softer.

She sniffled once, trying to gather herself together, blinking it all away so she could look up at him. “Um...I...I think I’m done here. Let’s eat dinner.”

-

It wasn’t difficult in a small town like this to find a place where the fog of city lights didn’t blur the stars to invisibility. She liked to imagine they were hundreds of little far-away spaceships all floating up there, home to some other world. Of course that was pretend, and probably a product of watching way too much Stargate, 

“They’re not spaceships,” Shaun was quick to say once she’d coaxed him up on the hood of the old Chevelle and broken out the picnic she’d packed for them earlier. “They’re balls of burning gas held together by equal and opposite forces. It’s simple.” He gave a sloppy shrug while he meticulously shredded the crust from his peanut butter and jelly sandwich. 

She chuckled. “Yeah, I know that, but what if they weren’t? If you didn’t know they were balls of gas, what do you think they’d be?”

“Hmmm...people.”

She leaned back on her elbows, looking up at him. “Yeah? Why do you say that?”

“Because...it only takes a small amount of energy for the gases a star is made of to burn. Sometimes...I think people make big decisions based on small amounts of information. Sometimes it’s bad. But sometimes it’s good too.”

Lea smiled over at him through the dimness. “You’re pretty smart.”

“Yes, I think so too.”

She gave a thin chuckle and looked upwards, watching the stars glint.

“There is a new resident on our team,” Shaun said after a few moments of quiet.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yes. Her name is Sarah McNeese. She moved her residency from Florida. Her husband got a job at Tesla.”

“Wow. Fancy.”

“You could work at Tesla.”

She concentrated on one particularly bright star, focusing hard.

She felt another sting of tears and swallowed against it. “Maybe…” she said, strained and shaky.

“Did I make you cry again?”

She closed her eyes and sighed. “No.  _ You _ didn’t. I’m ok, promise.”

In the dark, up here in the middle of nowhere with only the overhead lights in the cab to give a little light, silence seemed way too empty.

She took a long breath. “Shaun…” she started.

“I like Hershey…” he interrupted suddenly. The defeat, the acceptance in his tone was apparent, and it did absolutely nothing to quell the churning in her gut.

“It’s late. We should go home.” He scooted forward to slide off the hood.

In the car, they rode in silence. To him, it probably didn’t feel out of the ordinary, but on her side of the car, she was sorting through what he’d said.

She was happy here. Really happy. Spending her time doing exactly what she’d dreamt of for so long. 

Leaving him had been hard—on the both of them. But they both had changes to work through. Now on the other side of that, there was still thousands of miles between them and would be indefinitely.

She couldn’t go back, but he couldn’t come here. 

Was it fair? Was it worth it? To keep dragging this out…no matter how much a change in outlook had helped the both of them…? Keep going back and forth like this until one of them moved on without the other? She didn’t want to regret bringing him here; she wanted to enjoy what they had, but what happened after?

She sighed and settled deeper into the seat, focusing dead ahead.

Shaun shifted in his seat, and she didn’t notice until the sound of some soft, slow ballad was filling the car that he’d reached across to turn on the radio.

When she glanced over at him, he was staring out into the night, fidgeting his fingers in his lap. 

-

When they pulled up to the house, he was quiet and wouldn’t meet her eye. Nothing new, but she knew something— _ something— _ had wedged between them now. This wasn’t the normal silence.

She felt like the jerk who barged in just to vent about petty problems all over again.

“I…”

She turned to look at him when he spoke, her curls flying over one shoulder, keys halfway turned in the lock. 

“I hope you had a good time tonight,” he said a little quieter than his normal volume, hands twitching at his sides, eyes on her.

She left the keys dangling, turning to face him, genuinely charmed that he’d remembered her silly half-drunk dissertation on dates. She let a small smile win against the the confusion in her head. 

“I did,” she said. “You’re a really good scrub tech.”

His smile was small and shy and hopeful, and it was enough to melt away the tension completely. He rolled back on his heels, his focus skittering away to the space just to the left of her.

“You make very nice picnics. I hope we can do it again soon.”

She grinned, stepping aside when he inched forward to push open her door.

She watched him wait, his expression calculating, focus flicking between her and the ground, fingers knitting together over his stomach. She leaned a shoulder against the doorframe, a pointed cue to the next step in the routine.

It took a few moments, but she stayed patient while he shuffled forward and then his too-bright gaze settled solely on her, illuminated by the orangey glow of the porch light. 

She smiled and tipped up her chin. 

When he leaned in this time, it wasn’t half-bowed and unsure. He did still have to duck to meet her, but his movements were more natural now, and if she wanted to ruin the moment, she would’ve asked if he’d been practicing. Still, his hands kept to his sides, hers stuffed in the pockets of her jacket. 

This kiss was firmer, more confident than the first one at that dingy motel, and it was all she could do not to press deeper on pure instinct. She let a hand settle on his cheek, cradling him more than keeping him there.

He pulled away and dipped his chin, rolling his lips together, but didn’t back away from her. 

“I...um...I don’t think I told you about this part,” she said breathlessly, peering at the thin shadows her fingers drew over his cheek. She cleared her throat and dropped her hand, changed her tone to something more like teasing. “Depending on how well the date went, how many we’ve been on, and how well we know each other, I might ask you to come inside. So...do you wanna come in for a bit?” She mimicked something generic she might’ve said to another guy.

“I do,” he answered almost instantly. “My things are inside.”

She grinned wide and tried to swallow her laugh. She reached down to set gentle fingers on his wrist, guiding him while she stepped backwards and over the threshold. 

-

There wasn’t any solution she could find in the speckled patterns of the entire expanse of ceiling. 

What they had was what they’d been given these few days, and if that was all she got, she didn’t want to waste it on decisions that couldn’t be combed through between now and when his flight left for California again. 

This was not something she’d given a definition to even from the beginning, and maybe that’s what made it so hard to pin down.

Were they friends? Were they dating? Friends didn’t kiss, not even shy, innocent first-time kisses. And she was pretty sure Shaun saw it that way, too. She would...in a heartbeat...if the time was right...if the distance was closer…

An arrhythmic knock made her jolt upright in bed.

She scrambled out of the tangle of her comforter and across the room, barefoot. On the other side of the threshold, there he was in a plain t-shirt, pajama pants, and matched but polka dotted socks, clutching the case of her signed baseball in his hands.

“I can’t sleep,” he said, gaze unfocused.

“Me neither,” she admitted openly, somewhat shocked that she’d said it.

He shifted, hummed quietly.

“Do you...Will you…” She sighed and set her hip. She couldn’t find the words. “Will you just be close to me?” It sounded so stupid out loud, but it was out and she couldn’t take it back now. 

Shaun shuffled forward, and she moved aside to let him in, shutting the door behind him. 

He held the baseball aloft, a sort of misplaced olive branch that made her eyes prick all over again when she reached to take it with quiet thanks and set it on the dresser. 

Then she moved to tug out the trundle bed, already made with a clean set of sheets. She pulled the blue fleece throw blanket from the foot of her bed and spread it over the sheets, then climbed up and over, back onto her bed, curling up on the very edge of the mattress.

Once he was comfortable beside her, she reached down a hand. At first it just hung there, useless and awkward. She traced a finger over the rail of the bed frame, ready to pull back when she finally felt warm fingers against hers.

“Lea…”

She looked down at him, expecting him to go on, but his eyes were already closed, his other hand laid flat over his chest. 

She watched him for a moment, memorizing the line of silver moonlight cast on his hair from the tall window.

At some point, her own eyes fell closed, and the last thing she knew before sleep was Shaun’s fingers twining through hers.

-

He was awake before her, of course, lying there beside her, facing the ceiling wide eyed as if he’d never even dozed off. 

When she peeled down at him, messy bed head and all, he smiled up at her like he’d been waiting.

She hopped into the shower, and then they traded places while she whipped up some pancakes. Luckily, she remembered exactly how he took them.

He was still fiddling with the last button on his shirt when he stepped around the corner into the kitchen. “I smell pancakes…”

“Of course you do! What kind of hostess would I be without making pancakes for you?  _ With _ chocolate chips, I might add."

“Syrup?”

“Oh, definitely.” She set the table with both plates , and gestured for him to sit.

“So I was thinking we could go into the city today. Philly?” She went on once they’d both tucked in. “It’s a really long drive to Pittsburgh, and even though it’s got my heart, Philly’s fun too. You ever had a Philly cheesesteak?”

“That...sounds...disgusting,” he measured, deadpan, making her giggle.

“They’re really good, but kinda messy. And there’s all kinds of other cool stuff. The Liberty Bell, Independence Hall. That touristy stuff, if you care about that kinda thing. Oh! There’s actually this really cool, really creepy museum with all this weird medical stuff! I think they’ve got Einstein’s brain in there or something? That could be cool!”

His shoulders drew up, a silent smile forming around his mouthful of pancakes.

She laughed. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

.

“You’re quiet.”

“Huh? What’d you say?”

“You’re not normally quiet.”

She wanted to reach over and shove him in the shoulder at the jest, but when she looked at him, his expression was empty. “Are you thinking about what upset you last night?” he continued.

She led them around the corner, circling the upper level of the Mūtter Museum for the third time in a row. “I wasn’t upset last night,” she confirmed. “I was just…thinking…”

“You were quiet in the car after the picnic. Did something I said last night upset you?”

“Shaun, no…” she said earnestly, looking up at him. “I promise I’m not upset. I’m just…” She stopped, turning to face him. “Hey, let’s try and have fun today, ok? I want to enjoy this time with you.”

He didn’t comment further, just turned away to peer into a long glass case of primitive surgical tools.

“So...how did you know you wanted to be a doctor?” She changed the subject and sided up to him, close at his shoulder.

He didn’t look up. “I didn’t want to.”

She smirked. “What do you mean?”

“It just happened. I read through most of Doctor Glassman’s library in the first week I stayed with him after my brother died.”

She nodded. The first thing he’d connected with. The first thing that fed his mind in precisely the way it had longed for for so long.

“Why did you want to become an engineer?”

“That stuff came easy for me too. I was always at my grandpa’s garage. My mom couldn’t keep me away. It was like our thing, ya know? He taught me everything I know. Guess being a math nerd helped too.”

“It’s strange…” Shaun tempered, looking up, threading his fingers together.

“What is?”

“How people tend to choose paths that link them to the people they’ve lost. Why?”

“Maybe it makes us feel close to them.”

Shaun watched her a moment, as if considering this, then cocked his head to the side. “What  _ is _ ...a Philly cheesesteak?”

She grinned.

-

“Its good…” he conceded flatly after swallowing down the first bite.

She giggled at him across the little bistro table, digging hers out of the tissue paper wrappings. “I’m glad you like it.”

He took another too-big bite and turned to look out over the street.

“I like Philadelphia,” he said once he’d swallowed.

“I’m a Pittsburgh girl, born and raised, but honestly...Philly is awesome. It’s also nice to live outside of that inner-city bubble now, and have some peace and quiet, but still get to drive into the city when I feel like it. Can’t beat it.”

Comfortable silence settled as they worked through their meals. Comfortable until Shaun spoke up again, looking up from his sandwich.

“I don’t think I feel close to my brother.”

“What?”

“I don’t feel close to my brother. Or my rabbit. You said sometimes we do things because it makes us feel close to people we lost.”

She blinked, trying to formulate a response, but before she could catch up, he went on.

“Doctor Glassman lost his daughter, and he says he still loves her. Maybe we can still love people we lost, but we can’t bring them back. Love means loss.”

It was almost like a surrender. Something he’d believed all his life, formulated out of two tragic experiences that had summed up everything following.

She looked away, searching for the right thing to say like it was written on her plate.

“There’s something you don’t want to tell me,” he said bluntly, suddenly, interrupting any thought she could’ve had on the matter.

“What?” she said again.

His brow furrowed. “It’s one of the seven reasons why people lie. To pacify others. Why are you not telling me things just to keep me happy?”

“I’m…” she started, coming up short. “Shaun. It’s not that I wanted to keep things from you. It’s that… I just didn’t know how to say it.”

She watched him, waiting patiently with his hands over his stomach. It was clear that it was her move now. Now or never.

“I like you, Shaun,” she started, the simplest way she knew. “I really  _ really _ like you. You’re sweet, and charming, and honest, and cute. When I first moved here, it was really hard to leave you...because…” She shrugged. “I think things went deeper than I realized, and faster than I realized. And I’m really glad you came to visit me, but while you’ve been here, it’s like having someone you lost back and…” She looked up at him to test if he was following, but his posture hadn’t changed much. “I’ve been thinking a lot...maybe too much...about those things...things like kissing and dates...and what it would mean if…. Like what a proper relationship is. I just don’t know if that would work for us. We live so far apart, and we’re going two different ways… But I don’t want you to think that I’m just a friend either. Am I making sense?”

“I think so…” His gaze was off somewhere over the street again.

She shook her head. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything… It just makes things more complicated… Maybe we should just...”

“I told everyone you were my girlfriend.”

She looked up sharply. “You...did...?”

“When I went back to work after our road trip, Doctor Andrews told me I needed to confirm with my attending about taking time off. I said I’d be sure to get permission from Doctor Melendez if I took another road trip with my girlfriend.” He recounted, matter-of-factly.

Lea blinked at him, agape. The road trip had ended on a sour note; he’d run away, caught a bus back to San Jose, and she’d tried to mend fences with a knock on his apartment door the next evening. They’d talked. She’d made sure he understood, that there weren’t any hard feelings. But the next thing she knew, he was talking about moving his residency. Whatever had happened, whatever Claire had said offhand had struck him enough to make him reconsider lots of things; even enough to get him to see a therapist. Now on the other side of that, and with what he’d said last night about being happy...maybe she was over complicating it. Maybe they could work it out step by step, for themselves, in their own way, at their own pace. There didn’t have to be a road map.

She could almost imagine how these staunch, self-important, cliched San Jose doctors must’ve reacted to the news that Shaun Murphy might possibly have a girlfriend.

She let out a sudden burst of laughter much too loud for a public setting, causing several other patrons to look over in interest. “You said that? To your boss?” She clamped a hand over her mouth. “I’m not laughing  _ at you _ , I promise. I just...” She bit back another giggle.

Shaun looked on, confused. “What’s funny?”

“It’s…” She giggled. “It’s funny to think about their faces when you...it’s just...”

“Are you my girlfriend, then?” he asked simply. His eyes shone bright, centering on her.

Her giggling subsided and she pushed her hair over one shoulder, smirking at him. “Well… Do you want me to be?”

“Yes.” He nodded once, flashing his teeth when he smiled. “I do.”

She drew her lip between her teeth, grinning. No, it certainly wasn’t complicated. Not with Shaun. “Ok.”

“Ok.” He went back to his fries.

She smiled, watching him a minute or two while he picked through the burnt, crispy ones and put them aside.

“Thank you, Shaun.”

“For what?”

“For reminding me some things are just simple.”

He smiled up at her, eyes glinting with pride, before taking another bite of his sandwich.

-

“Remember to call me, ok? Promise?”

“Yes. I promise.”

“I promise too.”

Shaun blinked down at her, clutching his boarding pass in both hands.

“Maybe Claire can teach you how to FaceTime. I’d like to meet her.”

“i would like that.” He nodded eagerly.

She chewed at her lip, burrowed her hands further into her pockets. “And don’t wait nine months to visit me next time.” She reached over, knocking her elbow against his side. “Or...maybe I can find some time to visit. Maybe Christmas? That’s only three months. You think San Jose will still let me in? Or am I too much of a traitor?”

“There isn’t a law that prohibits citizens from entering San Jose,” he said, making her snort.

“You’re so silly, Shaun Murphy.”

“Christmas would be nice,” he agreed.

He was quiet a moment, and she was nearly ready to murmur out a goodbye when he spoke up again.

“Should I kiss you?”

She beamed and bounced on the balls of her feet. “If you want to.”

He leaned close, right there in the terminal amongst the crowd of rushing people, to leave her with something chaste and delicate and small, but after a final hug, when she had turned for the sliding doors, leaving him behind in the middle of the crush, it settled warm and familiar in her chest, unique and distinct and  _ theirs. _

**Author's Note:**

> [allscissorsallpaper](allscissorsallpaper.tumblr.com) on Tumblr.


End file.
